Darling, Don't Be Afraid
by vapourtrailreads
Summary: All she'd wanted was no regrets. Standard. Written for THC Round 6, stacked with QLFC Round 2


A/N:

Thanks so much to Elaine, Viola and Di for reading through.

The completely unrelated title is taken from A Thousand Years by Christina Perri.

**Darling, Don't Be Afraid**

Pandora Lovegood's father used to say that knowledge was realising that the road was one-way, but wisdom was looking in both directions before crossing it anyway.

She'd known that telling Perseus about her plan for her Cloning spell would not garner a positive reaction. Yet, she knew it had to be done - it was her duty to inform her closest family of all major happenings in her life.

That had not made _seeing_ his reaction any less upsetting.

"_Absolutely not,_" thundered Perseus through the Floo connection. "It's too risky, Pandora. You could end up Splinched permanently, or end up losing control of your Apparition abilities. It's happened before, and it can happen again. I _forbid_ you."

"But just imagine it, Zee," she said hopefully. "I could get more done in a day than the Ministry can in two months." Most people would have felt uncomfortable making such comments in front of a Ministry employee, but Pandora knew that her brother loved her too much to rat on her. And it wasn't in his nature to be a snitch. "In a single day, I could visit the faeries in the forests of the Amazon, help the dragon trainers in Romania, and hold my guest Charms lecture at Hogwarts, and-"

"If the grass is greener on the other side, you can bet the water bill is higher." Perseus shook his head, short cropped hair swishing around his forehead in the Floo fire. "You know I'll always support you, Pandora, but… this is taking it too far. The risks far outweigh the benefits."

"Zee, I'll be fine," she soothed. "At any rate, I have Xeno to help me, and he knows his stuff just as well as I do."

"I just think that this is overplanning things," he muttered. "Life is too unpredictable to plan. You should just make the most of what we have right now."

"Well, what I have now is the power to make sure I don't leave any _regrets,_" Pandora snapped heatedly, and Perseus shut up. She registered the discomfort in her brother's face, and backtracked.

Pandora clasped her hands, wincing as the veins turned from blue to blackish-green with the pressure. She still hadn't gotten used to the sight of the cursed veins, even after over three decades of seeing them.

By the good grace of Merlin, the malediction had been merciful to the Fawleys for many centuries. The last victim had died at age twenty-three almost seven hundred years ago.

Of course, they hadn't thought that the curse might befall her. No one could have predicted the moment she fainted during a flying lesson in third year. When the healers' report came in, thirty parchments worth of complicated medical jargon, mother had fainted, overwhelmed by the horrifying possibility that she might go the same way as poor Teresa had all those years ago.

"This blood curse… for thirty-one years, it hasn't bothered me in the slightest. But now I have commitments. I have a family. I have _Luna. _And I'm afraid that the curse may not consider that when it takes me to see Merlin, it'll be taking me away from my responsibilities before I can make provisions for them." Pandora wrung her hands and sat down on the carpet, facing the fireplace. "I know that if anything happens to me, you and Xeno will take good care of Luna. But what if - what if you didn't have to? What if I could give her a normal childhood, with a mother, father and uncle? What if I could guarantee that this curse doesn't take me before she finishes Hogwarts and I don't have to worry about her getting hurt or being left out?"

Perseus glared at a spot she couldn't see, worrying at a flap of skin on his lip.

"I expect there's nothing I can do to change your mind," he said, resignation in his tone. She smiled wistfully.

"Be careful, Dora."

"I always am."

_XXXXXXXX_

The man dressed in teal from head to toe took a final sip of Gurdyroot tea and set his teacup down daintily on the chipped saucer. "Ready, love?"

"As ready as I'll ever be."

Pandora beamed fondly at her husband. His wispy white-blond hair had been hurriedly brushed, and was tied back in a short ponytail that adorably resembled a Muggle makeup brush. Many had commented that Xenophilius had a weird taste in clothing and fashion, but she thought of it as a sign of his vibrant individuality.

_Xenophilius. Lover of the strange._

It was a fitting name, and he fit perfectly into the unsolved puzzle of her life, another blessing the universe had bestowed upon her, to help her pursue the answer to the never-ending mystery of existence.

"Does this mean that there will be many, many Mums in our house from now on?" Luna swung her skinny legs as she sat on the stool that Xenophilius had just vacated. Pandora's heart melted at the sight of her daughter, braids hanging innocently down her back, silvery eyes peering at her.

"Yes, darling," she said softly, in the tone she only used with her family. "We can play with the Plimpies in the stream every day, and Daddy and I can take you to Romania and visit nice Mr. Weasley and his dragons again."

"Oooh!" Luna clapped her hands in glee, and Pandora's smile grew impossibly wider.

Xenophilius raised his wand, tracing the protective barrier around their daughter, who sat obediently, angelic naivety glowing on her face. He finished the Shield Charm and turned back to Pandora, hand gripping his wand tightly enough that she could see his knuckles whitening.

Pandora picked up the stabilising potion she'd prepared and downed it, attempting to swallow her nerves with it. She licked her lips and wiped her sweaty palms on her dress.

"Three, two..." Xeno tightened his grip on the wand.

She sucked in a deep breath.

"One."

They spoke the incantation at the same time, blinding light bursting from their wands, filling up the room. Pandora could see it already, countless days of teaching Luna to make Plimpy soup and creating new charms to do amazing things and the three of them searching together for the Crumple-Horned Snorkack. So many things to do, and now she would have all the time she wanted to do them all.

_Something's wrong. _

As soon as the thought formed in her mind, her wand began to vibrate in her hand, so violently that it hurt. Pandora yelped and dropped it, but the vibrating didn't stop - if anything it intensified even more, multiplying tenfold every second. It hurt. _She_ hurt. Everything _hurt._

A howl of pure agony tore itself free of her as she dropped to her knees, then her side. It felt like a celestial pair of hands had taken hold of her soul and was ripping her apart piece by piece. She felt her bones cracking, her skin straining to hold her together, her brain burning in her skull, and nothing she did could make it stop make it stop make it _stop- _

Faintly, she could hear a child screaming, a man calling a name. She wanted to run to her, stroke the blond curls so much like her own, tell her not to cry, please please please don't cry Luna baby _please,_ but the haze of pain had her and she couldn't move even if she'd tried.

"_Pandora!_"

She couldn't remember her name. She couldn't remember what she'd been doing, all she could do was yell back at the voice but the words wouldn't come out of her mouth, they were lodged in her throat, _Xeno, I'm so sorry, I-_

All she'd wanted was no regrets.

XXXXXXXX

Pandora Lovegood looked both ways, but she did not cross the road peacefully. Death swung his scythe and ferried her over the road, piece by piece, until all that remained was silence.

**_XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX_**

**The Houses Competition**

House: Ravenclaw

Year: 3

Category: Standard

Prompt: [Speech] "Life is too unpredictable to plan."

Word Count: 1314

**_XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX_**

**Quidditch League Fanfiction Competition**

Team: Appleby Arrows

CHASER 1: **Write about a character(s) being perceived as two-faced but in actually are just misunderstood OR write about a character(s) who has so many interests they want to pursue that they attempt to or successfully clone themselves.**

OPTIONAL PROMPTS:

#9: (dialogue) "If the grass is greener on the other side, you can bet the water bill is higher."

#10: (quote) Knowledge is realising that the road is one-way; wisdom is looking both directions before crossing anyway.

#14: (emotion) regret

Word Count: 1314


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